Facebook Anonymous Login Introduced For Third-Party Apps

At a Facebook developer conference on Wednesday, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said you no longer need to share your personal data when logging into third-party apps. Before, when logging into any service with your Facebook credentials, you’d have to allow access to personal data, like your friends list, and accept a ton of permissions. But going forward several improvements will mean Facebook logins will now be anonymous, giving users granular control over what is and isn’t shared.

Zuckerberg noted that people started to become afraid of logging in with their Facebook accounts, fearing their personal information would be misused. When you login anonymously, none of your personal information will be shared, and nothing will be posted to your wall. There’s still an option to login with your account, just as you would have before, but you’re able to stipulate what information that app gets. You’ll have to provide a little data in order for some apps to work, but the fact that you now have control should put some users at ease.

On anonymous login, Facebook said the option is there so users can try an app out before deciding if they are comfortable sharing info. “We are testing Anonymous Login with a few developers, and we plan to open it up to more developers in the coming months,” Facebook announced. If you do decide to login with your Facebook account, you have control over information such as friend list, email address, birthday and more. Everything can be checked or unchecked, so you don’t need to share any information if that makes you uncomfortable; it appears the only requirement is you share your public profile, which reveals your name, age and sex

Of course, there’s a benefit to sharing your information, like your friends list, since it allows you to find other people who are using the same app. In a game, for example, you may want to share that data to compete on leaderboards. Or in an app like Snapchat, you may share personal data like your name and friends list to find people to follow.

Facebook said the new login will be rolling out over the next few months. Meanwhile, Facebook is also redesigning its app control panel, making it much easier for users to keep track of what apps are connected to their profile. This new feature is set to be available in the coming weeks, Facebook said.